This sort of expectation had been coming for a while. Hong Kong’s true blue chips, those linked to the government or to Li Ka-Shing, had been tightening the screw for years in sourcing their funding, taking advantage of the benign performance of credit markets that had prevailed for years before the sub-prime problems. Bankers, while never ready to walk away from blue-chip clients, had been getting more and more alarmed as the levels they were being asked to lend at got closer and closer to thei

Loans bankers insist it is "business as usual" in the domestic markets, which like the rest of Asia Pacific, have been largely insulated from the US sub-prime meltdown. Demand remains strong for no-frills corporate loans and even private-equity-backed leveraged deals are back, albeit with more conservative structures than before. “Acquisitions are still being discussed, both by private equity houses and corporate to corporate acquisitions. There is also a lot of activity in the project finance a

The latest mammoth deal is Melco PBL Gaming Macau's US$1.75bn dual-tranche loan. Despite the recent turmoil in global financial markets, mandated lead arrangers ANZ Investment Bank, Banc of America Securities Asia, Barclays Capital, Citi, Deutsche Bank and UBS got a good response to the deal with 11 banks joining in sub-underwriting and more than 40 banks turning up for the bank meeting on October 12 and subsequent site visit. Banks attributed the blowout response to rich returns and the solid r

It is a regional story. In South Korea, for example, in a sign M&A activity may be returning to this once-hot market after several moribund years, there is Doosan Infracore’s US$4.9bn bid for Ingersoll-Rand’s Bobcat division, while several mooted private-equity divestments promise more activity ahead. In Malaysia, the acquisition of Maxis Communications by Binariang GSM – in essence, a take-private transaction – has been a pivotal deal. Singapore Power was part of the investor group that took on

The year 2007 has been largely an India story primarily because of the activity it has generated in the global capital markets. The India story that is unfolding on the global M&A stage has a parallel in the capital and finance markets. What would have been hard to believe just a couple of years ago has turned out to be true. India now leads the loan league tables for Asia (ex-Japan, ex-Australasia), outclassing the traditionally busier and bigger Hong Kong and Taiwanese markets. With around US$

The loan market has displayed its famous resilience in Asia again this year with the deal flow from many jurisdictions strong despite the much talked about sub-prime turmoil that has become the constant backdrop to capital markets issuance this year. Even more encouraging than the strong deal flow is the fact that large event-linked loans have been the defining feature of this year’s loan issuance and these are exactly the sort of transactions that banks like for not only are they drawn faciliti